subsequently occupied by his half-brother and successor, Sir John,
[Footnote: In the riots of '80--as Dickens has not forgotten to note in
_Barnaby Rudge_--the house was destroyed by the mob, who burned Sir
John's goods in the street (Boswell's _Johnson_, chap. lxx.)] who,
writing to the Duke in March 1770, to thank him for his munificent gift
of an additional ten years to the lease, recalls "that princely instance
of generosity which his Grace shewed to his late brother, Henry
Fielding."

What this was, is not specified. It may have been the gift of the leases
of those tenements which, as explained, were necessary to qualify
Fielding to act as a Justice of the Peace for the county of Middlesex;
it may even have been the lease of the Bow Street house; or it may have
been simply a gift of money. But whatever it was, it was something
considerable. In his appeal to the Duke, at the close of the last
chapter, Fielding referred to previous obligations, and in his
dedication of _Tom Jones_ to Lyttelton, he returns again to his Grace's
beneficence. Another person, of whose kindness grateful but indirect
mention is made in the same dedication, is Ralph Allen, who, according
to Derrick, the Bath M.C., sent the novelist a present of L200, before
he had even made his acquaintance, [Footnote: Derrick's Letters, 1767,
ii. 95.] which, from the reference to Allen in _Joseph Andrews_,
probably began before 1742. Lastly, there is Lyttelton himself,
concerning whom, in addition to a sentence which implies that he
actually suggested the writing of _Tom Jones_, we have the express
statements on Fielding's part that "without your Assistance this History
had never been completed," and "I partly owe to you my Existence during
great Part of the Time which I have employed in composing it." These
words must plainly be accepted as indicating pecuniary help; and, taking
all things together, there can be little doubt that for some years